


Razorblade

by cristianoronaldo



Category: Football RPF, Sports RPF
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-18
Updated: 2015-06-18
Packaged: 2018-04-04 23:34:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 15,538
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4157169
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cristianoronaldo/pseuds/cristianoronaldo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“If we didn’t hate each other so much, we would be friends.” </p><p>“But that’s the problem,” Toni said sadly. “We don’t hate each other at all.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Razorblade

**Author's Note:**

> I'm disgusting because I don't believe in resolving things. Also I'm tired, and I want to post something, but I don't feel like writing anymore of this because I have nothing left to write, so here is the (un)finished product. 
> 
> discussions in the comments. i'm getting back to answer everything. 
> 
> i didn't go through an editing process so watch our for inconsistency and spelling mistakes, etc.

Some of his very first memories were comprised of the lives of the saints that he had studied over the years in Catholic school. He remembered how he’d looked up to them, how they were his heroes because of their strength, their kindness, their faith-- and then he remembered how life had changed. Tragic circumstance hadn’t broken his faith, but over the years, hardships and turmoil had ground at it, and one day he woke up and found that his faith was smaller than it once had been. And one day, he woke up and searched his mind and his heart for some last vestige of connection to the otherworldly, a relic of some lost age, but the period of his faith was lost. He’d left it behind like a forgotten stuffed animal, and the church hymns only echoed distantly in his mind when he was forced to remember. 

 

There was one instance, his First Communion, in which he thought he’d experienced a miracle, but he later chalked it up to nerves, the harsh lighting, that uplifted feeling that the pure of heart got when they think they _should_ be feeling something greater. He’d taken the host in his hands, and then in his mouth, and he saw a great light and felt a great presence, but it was just the lighting. And that feeling foolish people got when they have not yet learned about reality. 

 

That was one thing that had kept his faith alive for a very long time, and then it was the lives of the saints, and he wore their medals on his neck. And his father, who helped him make countless flashcards for his tests in theology-- both of them were fascinated back then, and their shared fascination made Isco love his father with a ferocity he never thought possible. His father, for his birthday and sometimes for no reason at all, gifted him with the most exquisite medals imaginable. 

 

On a silver oval was engraved an image of the saint, his or her name, and what they were a patron of. He wore them around his neck with pride, and every time he was hit with a bundle of nerves, he touched a finger to the medal he had chosen for that day, and his fears were calmed because he truly believed that something greater than himself existed and that this was the destiny of man: to believe, to love, to inspire and to be inspired. 

 

When people told him that life was unfair, he shrugged because everyone had something to be happy about and everyone had something to be sad about, and if this wasn’t the epitome of _fair_ , what was? 

 

But as he grew, life grew from very fair to fair to slightly less than fair until it descended into complicated, and this was around the time that he was halfway through high school and already moody about the hundred thousand ridiculous and not-so-ridiculous things teenagers had to worry about. So he was moody, and he prayed less, and then he didn’t pray, and he wore his medals only because he was terrified of what would happen if he did not. Eleven years of Catholic school had struck the fear of the Living God in him. 

 

Then he just got sick of it. Through the stress of the SATs and the tests in school and the unnecessary pain in the world that didn’t have that much to do with him but still felt like a relevant pain-- through everything, his faith took a beating. In that time, he was tired of the mess the world had become in his eyes, and he both envied and hated the people in his church, his school, even his group of friends that could live and be hopeful. He wondered if they possessed an extraordinary gift or if they were just blind. 

 

He was sick of fearing some unnatural disaster just because his thoughts were sinful or because he wanted to kiss someone or because he wanted to be rebellious. He didn’t want to be pious or naive, and he didn’t want to accept that the god he had once loved and trusted would turn him away because he liked the dark-haired boy who’d grown up in Morocco and sat in his homeroom playing with uneven glasses. 

 

By then, he’d already related it all-- the church, the prayer, the piety-- to something oppressive and cruel, and Mass made Hell seem like Spring. He took the medals off, and he didn’t wear them again, and his father said it was because he was a teenager full of angst and a desire to grow without limits, but Isco knew that he had left his faith behind because he could not kill the parts of himself that his religion considered dark. 

 

His father didn’t know that he had gone from praying every night to fucking the Moroccan boy in his class who spoke about his home country like he was talking about constellations. So his love shifted from some otherworldly Being in the sky to a boy so beautiful he resembled the sky. 

 

He didn’t tell his parents, and he went off to college with a broken heart because His Boy had gone back home, as he had always wanted, and that was very far away. They kept up with handwritten letters and emails because it seemed more personal, but then somewhere along the way, it began to feel weak and embarrassing that he loved someone so far away, and it was weak and embarrassing to even use that word, love. They stopped communicating long after the fire had died out, and just before the indifference turned into hatred. 

 

Isco moved on faster than he expected. After a couple of days spent moping around, he ate a pizza and a pint of ice cream with his friends, telling no one of his sorrow, and he finally realized he was only sad because he felt like he should be, not because he truly was. 

 

So he traded one Should Be Doing for another, and he partied because he felt like he should. He lost himself, that first year, in the dizzying chaos of activity, of movement, of burning and of lust. He went to class less than he should have and more than the majority of his friends. He never established himself as the Alcoholic and he never wandered into the dorm hall fully naked, but he let himself loose in ways that made him squirm in the morning. 

 

He kept his secret well enough. He fucked girls with just enough enthusiasm to seem believable, and it _was_ pleasure that he was getting, and he thought they were lovely, but it was like he was moving in the dark, and when he finally saw Barista Boy, the light flicked on. 

 

He was black-haired and blue-eyed with a cheerful smile. Isco could tell instantly that he was gay and that he could keep a secret-- not to mention that he made a mean cappuccino, but this was made clear over a series of watchful visits and the other facts were well-established halfway into his first time there. 

 

So they began their covert affair while Isco went on mustering enthusiasm for his obligatory fucks until one horrible evening in the middle of February when he realized, drunk in the snow, that he desperately wanted to speak to his parents and that he wanted to kiss his Barista in public, and he wanted to let go of this girl’s hand and lose her in the snow. 

 

But he walked her home, and he turned away and walked back to his dorm, and later she called him a gentleman and insisted he wasn’t the “sort of guy everyone said.” He wasn’t bothered by the rumors because he knew people considered him a generally nice person, pleasant to be around but moved a little quickly from girl to girl. At least they couldn’t accuse him of liking boys. 

 

He wasn’t concerned with the rumors that he moved too quickly though. He was concerned with the fact that, eight hours after he stood in the snow with a desire to speak to his parents and an even crazier desire to kiss Barista on the lips in public, he was still tortured by those feelings. 

 

He lay on his bed in socks and mittens and boxers until his roommate found him there and said something about class. He went to class, and he stopped going to parties, and people were just in that “man, you’ve been so busy lately. where have you been?” stage of realization when Spring Break rolled around. 

 

He called his parents and told them briefly that he was sorry he didn’t call more often and that he was going to Brazil for Spring Break, half-hoping they would tell him absolutely not. But they were so happy to hear from him that they sent him money he didn’t ask for. And so his conservative parents unknowingly sent him on vacation with his boyfriend and his boyfriend’s rowdy but accepting friends. 

 

Isco remembered a very pivotal moment, when was on the beach, and one of his friends had just texted saying “No way!!! Man, we’re in Brazil too for break!! Let’s hang!!!” He was hit with the horrible realization that his friends over-punctuated, and that his Friend life and his Boyfriend life were about to collide. And then all at once, his dream had turned into a nightmare, and what he feared most was coming true. He walked quickly back to his hotel room, and Barista Boy followed him, and his eyes weren’t happy anymore. 

 

He said, What’s wrong? 

 

And Isco replied, “I should have been more careful. Someone is going to see us.” 

 

Barista narrowed his eyes, and something between them snapped. They were hurling insults and then pouring out apologies, and they locked the door of their room, but every which way they turned, there was only indifferenceinstead of love. The fight had burned something out of them, and when they returned from Break, they saw each other only for coffee. Then Isco tried to come when Barista Boy wasn’t working-- for both their sakes and for the sake of the other customers who had to put up with their uncomfortable lack of eye contact and the alien recognition with which they exchanged their quiet greetings. 

 

So Isco finished the school year with a somewhat damaged heart, but still everything was mostly intact, and he found a balance between his parties and his schoolwork. He didn’t sleep with anyone else, and he returned to the old shame of his hand and his imagination, sometimes a picture or a video. 

 

He briefly tried to “cure” himself because boys had only ever caused him trouble-- first with his god and then with the earthly condition of his heart. But predictably, the doe-eyed girls with their fuck-me eyes and Catholic schoolgirl skirts didn’t hold his attention, and he still gravitated toward the videos with the men. Not with oiled backs and large arms and legs that could kick down trees, and the ads about doubling the size of his dick did nothing to spark his interest. But there were some videos that reminded him of what it felt like to be with a person who _mattered_ to him, and when he woke from the afterglow of his satisfaction, he felt empty but less empty than after fucking someone he could hardly feel and never know. 

 

But this new loneliness and mild self-loathing were things he could bear. So for summer, he packed away his pain and his belongings and headed home to find the brutal, persistent heat that had taken hold and would not let up for anything. 

 

That is how, in the midst of his confusion but some time after the dramatic events of the year, he found himself sweating with the walls in the poorly air-conditioned kitchen of his aunt Beatriz. His mother had gotten sick of his aimless wandering around the house with a bag of pretzels, so after a few slammed doors and some nonsense in her native tongue that Isco had long since forgotten, he got the message that he was not welcome. 

 

He headed over to his aunt’s, who was slightly more generous with the air-conditioning but still stubbornly believed that the body’s temperature was exactly what it needed to be. He was sitting there damp with sweat, watching the plants die in the corner, when a stranger walked into the room. He was barefoot, and he smelled like chlorine. 

 

Stupidly-- later he would blame it on the heat-- Isco asked, “Did you go swimming?” instead of “Who are you and what are you doing in my aunt’s kitchen?” 

 

The boy paused and said that he did and that the water was very nice. He crossed the kitchen to rummage through the refrigerator, found what he was looking for after a few moments. He dropped ice cubes into a glass and poured sparkling water over them with a flourish and a satisfied sigh that instantly annoyed Isco who, for the past half hour, had been sweating and dying for a glass of water but hadn’t thought to stand up and pour himself a glass. 

 

He looked nothing like Isco’s last boy-- no cheerful smile, no frantic motions, just a calm determination and a poised air. He had this look in his eyes like he had never been confused in his life and he didn’t plan on experiencing any kind of confusion at any point in the future. He was confident, sure of himself, and he met Isco’s eyes with a challenge he didn’t quite seem aware of. 

 

“I’m Toni,” he said, as if it should have been obvious. “Didn’t your mother tell you I’m here?” 

 

“My mother?” He stared blankly back. “No, Beatriz is my aunt.” 

 

“Yes, but your mother.” He continued to stare at Isco. 

 

His gaze was making nothing clearer, so Isco, frustrated by the heat and by the lack of understanding between them said, “What. The fuck.” 

 

“Your mother said she was going to tell you. I’m working in her restaurant this summer, but since the college isn’t keeping the dorms open for anything but summer classes...” He took a slow sip of water and tilted his head to the side, thinking, taking his time. “Your aunt offered her place. So I’m staying here.” 

 

“Don’t you have a home,” he asked somewhat rudely. 

 

“Yes. In Germany.” 

 

“Then why don’t you go back to your home in _Germany_?” he suggested snidely. 

 

He knew, distantly, that he should have been much nicer, but the heat was twisting his head, and the boy had _smug_ written all over him. Even the kindest smile would have seemed like a smirk. 

 

Then, he did something incredible. He reached for the refrigerator again and pulled out the jar of fresh caramel that Beatriz had just finished making. It was probably still cooling. He dipped his finger right in the little glass container and licked it, stared at Isco and did it again, and Isco knew in that moment that he hated this boy beyond rational thought. 

 

“School,” he said simply, not adorably or innocently, not at all trying to appeal to Isco’s Other side. “I’m here for school.” 

 

“So you’re not going back home to see your parents at all?” Now he was just being outwardly rude. It was the _heat_ , he told himself. The walls were sweating, the plants were dying, and he was only being an asshole because he was sweating and dying with them. 

 

Just as something changed in Toni’s eyes and he opened his mouth-- either to sneak more caramel or to formulate a response-- Beatriz called from the other room. She called Isco’s name three times before she appeared in the doorway, hair standing up all over the place, hands brushing her apron down hurriedly. 

 

She said, “Isco, that is none of your business, you ungrateful boy.” 

 

“Why is everyone calling me ungrateful today,” he muttered sourly. “Mom lost her shit because I was walking around the house eating pretzels. I’ll never understand what she has against me eating pretzels.” 

 

“She’s told you a million times,” his aunt told him, reaching over to hand Toni a spoon so he could eat the caramel easier. “It’s because you drop crumbs all over the place. Do you even listen to her when she lectures you?” 

 

“No,” he said. Beatriz made a face, and he held up his hands defensively. “How can I when she rants at me in Spanish?” 

 

Toni set the spoon and the glass container down gently on the counter. He moved forward thoughtfully and, withexaggerated hesitation, said, “Well. I mean. You could always learn Spanish.” 

 

Beatriz swatted him on the arm. “That’s my boy. Always smart, always thinking. Good thing we have your brain to run the restaurant this summer.” She turned to glare at Isco, and he rolled his eyes. “ _Good thing_ since Francisco’s has been rotting the second he forgot his mother tongue.” 

 

“Right, sorry I learned English.” 

 

He stood up, brushed past Toni without apologizing and walked over to the door. 

 

“Francisco, where are you going?” 

 

“Swimming.” 

 

“Did you bring something to swim in?” 

 

He ignored her and walked outside until he hit the pool, and then he unceremoniously threw himself in, clothes and all. When he looked to the window, he saw Toni standing there, spoon in one hand and caramel in the other, eating and watching, and then he turned back to Beatriz, and they began another pleasant conversation while Isco resisted the urge to swallow the chlorinated water until he had enough in his stomach to vomit on the two of them. 

 

It was fine when his aunt lectured him because she always did. That was their relationship. He spent summer days with her, sometimes helping her cook, sometimes working with her in the restaurant she owned with his mother. He complained, and she listened, and then she called him ungrateful, gave him a lecture and some advice. She told him she loved him, and everything was fine because he was the favorite. He was the _only_ , but he was also the favorite. 

 

And then Toni had to come along, and he was so immovable. Isco could see right away that he was not a thing to be shoved aside. He was going to sit in that kitchen and eat caramel all summer. 

 

He pushed off the wall and let himself float in a circle in the middle of the pool until the sun was burning his eyelids and he could feel his nose heating up, and then he was lost in that sun-struck oblivion and the cool water lapping at his cheeks did nothing to wake him from it. Lost in that pensive state, he thought back to the hot summers of his youth, when he would run through the small orchards in her backyard, past the tennis court, and run his fingers through the mud. He remembered the feel of a pitted cherry against his fingers, how his hands looked like they were covered in blood, and in those memories, he heard the musical language of his youth that had once captivated all his senses but, as he grew older, only made him more of an outsider. 

 

He heard the words he no longer understood, heard his mother’s thickly accented voice and his aunt’s less affected one, and then he sat straight up. In his effort to escape the memories that left him with such a bitter shame, he sank flailing to the bottom of the pool. 

 

He pushed off the bottom and sprang out of the shallow water somewhat ridiculously. He clung to the side of the pool and rubbed his eyes with shallow fists, regretting having jumped in with all his clothes on. He watched his aunt’s clothes dry on the clothesline hanging just outside the kitchen window, and he wondered just how much persuading it would take for her to give him some dry clothes. He figured he was better off just waiting for his own to dry, so he set up camp on one of the lawn chairs in front of the pool, shut his eyes, and fell asleep. 

 

+

 

He was in the shower when his hands ghosted over his body and he realized that it had been three days since he’d last gotten off. One day was spent traveling back home, another was spent with his family so his dick hadn’t really crossed his mind, and when he’d fallen into bed, he was too exhausted and frustrated and beaten down by jetlag to think about it. And his third day in town had been spent walking around the house with pretzels and the Wii remote, calling his sister over and over again in an attempt to get her to drive the half hour to come visit him. She hadn’t answered, his mother had grown frustrated, he’d nearly died in the poorly air-conditioned kitchen of his aunt, and his swim was not nearly as pleasant as he’d hoped. And in all the confusion and the chaos of his first days back home, he had forgotten about the chore that should never have been a chore in the first place. 

 

Unhappily, he groped himself with soapy fingers, knowing that it needed to happen sooner or later and he would feel much better once it was over, but-- He leaned against the shower wall and cursed under his breath. His hand never failed him. Okay, sometimes it failed him, but. _Never_. Never the way it was failing him in that shower. 

 

He washed the soap off, toweled dry, and rolled into bed with his laptop, thinking that maybe it was his lack of imagination that was killing his mood and not the fact that he needed fucking Viagra or something. He found something about being dominated, and he shrugged thinking that it would probably suit him just fine because he wasn’t all that picky, and he started, and he was just getting into it, just beginning to want to shut his eyes and let his hand work by feel alone when the door opened. 

 

“What the _fuck_ ,” he yelled, sweeping his laptop off the bed. It hit the ground with a loud thud, and he threw himself off the bed after it, half to protect the poor, old thing and half to preserve what little dignity he had left. “Honestly, do you knock? Have you ever heard of the concept of knocking? It’s not difficult.” 

 

There was an exaggerated pause. The door closed. And then Isco peered over the edge of the bed to see Toni knocking sarcastically on the inside of the door. He seemed unbothered that he had just caught Isco with his dick in his hand. 

 

“Is that good enough?” He asked. It was the opposite of considerate, and Isco felt like throwing his pillow or his laptop of possibly hurling his whole body at the other boy. “And I did knock, by the way. Maybe you would have heard that if _Loving Domination_ hadn’t been on so loud.” 

 

“ _Fuck_ off,” Isco snarled, snatching his comforter and standing up, holding it in front of his body. “And get out maybe?” 

 

Toni raised his eyebrows briefly at being told to fuck off, but it didn’t make much of an impact, and if Isco was being honest, he was mildly impressed at the way Toni was dealing with walking in on him masturbating. 

 

“I came to work out the hours with you,” he said. “Your mother said this was your room.” 

 

“And it obviously is,” he snapped, throwing his laptop back on the bed. “What about the hours? Why does it matter when I’m working?” 

 

“Because she said you were going to teach me.” He looked very smug,. “How to cook, how to be a waiter.” 

 

“Jesus,” he said. “Alright, fine. But. _Jesus_.” He said it loud so Jesus would hear him, and if Jesus was unreal, the sound of his name would make him real. 

 

“ _Isco_ ,” his mother shouted from the other room. “Francisco. Did you just say what I think you said?” 

 

He took a deep breath. “No, mom.” 

 

She rattled something off in Spanish, and he scratched the back of his head, trying not to lose his cool. To Toni, he gestured to the door. “Can you leave?” 

 

He shrugged. “Five tomorrow.” 

 

“Six thirty.” 

 

“Five thirty.” 

 

“Six fifteen.” 

 

Toni blinked. “Six.” 

 

“Six _fifteen_. And get out.” 

 

Toni hesitated. He wasn’t used to giving in, but he nodded once unhappily. “Fine. Have your fifteen extra minutes of mast--” 

 

“I will throw my cat at you.” 

 

“Masturbat--” 

 

“I will _throw my cat at you_.” 

 

Toni furiously stuck his hand in the bag of pretzels sitting by the door and shoved a handful in the pocket of his jeans. He somehow managed to remain dignified and smug. “I love these,” he said, pointing to the bag. “Sea Salt & Cracked Pepper is the best flavor.” 

 

“Were you raised in a fucking barn?” He crossed the room to snatch the bag away, struggling to keep the comforter covering his lower body. “Honey Mustard & Onion is obviously the best flavor.” Realizing a moment too late that they had something in common-- this love for pretzels-- he threw the bag on his desk and said, “Whatever. I hate pretzels.” 

 

For the first time since meeting, a genuine, amused smile flitted across Toni’s lips and he looked down, laughing a little under his breath. “Really? Are you five?” 

 

But he was hot and half-naked and annoyed, so he said, “I hate pretzels” again and, when Toni finally left, he went through the house, found every single bag of pretzels, and promptly stuffed them in the garbage can, ignoring the scandalized looks he received from his father. 

 

“Isco, you’re throwing out good food,” his mother yelled when she saw it in the trash. “You spoiled boy, what’s wrong with you? Did we really raise you to act like this?” 

 

“They’re pretzels. Can you please not overreact like this. You’re always yelling about crumbs anyway.” He made a face. “Apparently.” 

 

She paced around the kitchen furiously, finally rounding on him and pointing her finger right in his face. “You know what I did?” 

 

“What, mom.” 

 

“I raised an _American_.” 

 

“Mom, you can’t say stuff like that.” 

 

“ _Excuse me_?” 

 

“I said... you’re... more than welcome to insult Americans.” 

 

She pointed wordlessly to the hallway and, just like that, he was sent to his room like high school had never ended, college had never happened. She was his mother, and that was not going to change. He could be thirty, and she would still be able to send him to his room with just one look. 

 

Bored, he googled porn on his phone, but every time he tried to start again, he kept seeing Toni’s smug face as he knocked on the inside of the door, saw his smile, heard him mutter, “Are you _five?_ ” 

 

He couldn’t get it up, couldn’t sort through the confusion of his mind, so he buried his head in his pillow and let out a frustrated groan before turning back over and surveying what his room had become. There was a bean bag stuffed in the corner, green and falling apart. There was a jumble of cords beneath his desk, and a Spanish phrase book that his mother had bought him. There was one for every year of his life, stuffed somewhere in the bookshelf on one of the shelves he never looked at. On top of his dresser were the forgotten medals. 

 

He flipped back over. He remembered his alarm but didn’t reach over to set it, partly because he was lazy but mostly because he really wanted to get there at six thirty instead of six _fifteen_. 

 

+

 

Unfortunately, because he had gone to bed early, he ended up waking at five in the morning, and he couldn’t get back to sleep no matter how hard he tried, so he was stuck staring at the ceiling until he couldn’t take it any longer and he was forced to accept the fact that he might just have to make it to the restaurant on time. 

 

He got up, made himself breakfast and ate unhappily near the window where he could hear the sounds of quiet chirping. It was the most depressing sound in the world. He didn’t mind mornings so much when they were quiet, but once the birds started going at it, it was just so damn depressing to think about the world being awake that way. 

 

He cleaned his dishes and walked to the restaurant with his set of keys, opened it up, and set everything up in preparation for the early morning rush and, maybe, for Toni. 

 

They were fine at first, both too bleary-eyed to argue and, later, when the bleariness in their eyes died down, they were too focused on the customers to shout. Someone was always complaining about their coffee being too cold or something being too slow or their bacon not being raw enough, and there was no time to do anything but work, focus, prepare, anticipate. 

 

He showed Toni how to watch the other tables, how to properly serve a table, how to interrupt a conversation without letting anyone know he was interrupting a conversation, how to smile and walk away from a problem, and most importantly how to mop the floor. It was a job Isco detested, so he was more than thrilled to give it away. 

 

When the early morning rush died down, Isco let the other servers take over, and he led Toni to the back where they peeled oranges and pitted cherries and rolled dough until their hands were weary and Beatriz walked in, saw them laughing about how red their hands had become, and remarked, “I’m glad you boys are finally starting to get along.” 

 

Isco’s smile died down, and he turned to the sink to scrub his hands clean. “Do I get a pay raise for teaching newbie here how to do things?” 

 

“Do I get paid for dealing with you?” she returned. 

 

“I thought the pleasure of my company was enough.” 

 

She slung an apron around her neck and said, “It’s not.” 

 

For the rest of the day, Isco was very careful in his interactions with Toni. He kept them, at best, hostile. At worst, civil. He tried his very hardest to make sure there remained the same level of hatred and tension that existed in the house. It had prompted him to throw away all his pretzels, after all, and they couldn’t have been destroyed for nothing. He wouldn’t let something like that happen. 

 

After the first few times Isco snapped at him, Toni seemed confused, hovering at his shoulder like a lost puppy, holding the silverware and the napkins like he _knew_ he was doing everything right, and he just didn’t understand why Isco was yelling at him. Then he was standing in front of the oven shaking his head, saying, “But you said forty minutes, not twenty. Why am I--?” 

 

“Because I said so.” 

 

And that’s when it seemed to set in. That was when he understood. His eyes hardened, his jaw grew more stubborn, and he said, “Fine,” with a relaxed air, and opened the oven door with the Christmas mitt Beatriz always kept in the kitchen. “They’re not finished. Are you happy?” 

 

“Thrilled.” 

 

They stared at each other, and Toni’s eyes hardened even further. “You know you’re an asshole?” 

 

“Yeah,” Isco said, moving forward, “I know.” 

 

But the thing was, he wasn’t. He wasn’t an asshole. His mother nagged him a lot, and he gave her attitude because he was immature, and that’s what children did to their parents. He and his aunt squabbled because she had been like a second mother his entire life, because he worked in her kitchen after school in high school and for every summer he could remember long before that. It made sense for them to grow frustrated with their son, and it made sense for him to talk back to them. 

 

What they could not understand and what Isco could not understand about himself was why he was being so awful to Toni. Even in his most vulnerable, most frustrated moments away at school, he had never treated anyone with that lack of respect. Even when he was annoyed at a developing crush or being hounded by his RA, he was still kind. He maintained his sense of self, kept the easy smile and the biting humor that made people love him. But now something was changing, and later on, it was difficult for him to accept that he was not simply the decent person he had always expected himself to be. He was multi-faceted and complex, and he existed in more worlds than just the reality in front of him. 

 

He could be kind and loving in one moment and cruel and unforgiving in the next, and he never accepted this about himself because that meant accepting it about other people too. It meant accepting that people were not just horrible because they were horrible once. Their outburst didn’t mean that they were comprised solely of outbursts. It just meant that, in them somewhere, was an electric current, and that current had decided to blow. 

 

But inexplicably, Isco tapped only into this current destined to burst in his interactions with Toni, and for a little while-- against his better judgement-- he was comprised solely of outbursts. 

 

After his long shift at the restaurant ended, Isco walked out to his car, and Toni was standing there with his back to the building, holding his hand to his ear. At first, it was impossible to tell what he was doing, but after a second, Isco realized he was pressing a phone very hard to his ear. He was speaking in German, all hard sounds, like English but backwards and upside down. 

 

There was a breeze and no sense of urgency to the night, but Toni’s voice hovered just above it, tense and hurried and upset, complicated and anxious in a way Isco had never heard it and had never imagined it could be. Instantly, he regretted being so unkind, so immature, so devoted to keeping this boy at arm’s length for God only knows what reason. 

 

He hesitated only a moment longer, feeling sorry and dejected, and then he moved on. He drove away, thinking, tapping his fingers on the steering wheel, and when he pulled into the driveway, he grew even sorrier that he hadn’t swung around to see Toni’s face when he spoke. Suddenly he was gripped with a desire to study that eternally calm face when it was worried. 

 

When he walked inside, still lost in his thoughts, his sister was sitting at the kitchen table with a mug of coffee. He was very protective of his sister, and he loved her very much, but he didn’t know how to communicate that to her with words that made sense. He poured himself a cup of coffee and sat beside her, and they were silent for a long time until she said, “Heard you’re still a pain in the ass.” 

 

And he replied, “So you’ve spoken to Mom.” 

 

She sighed into her mug. “Do you ever thinking about learning Spanish? Or going back to Church? Or at least taking your saints’ medals to school with you? At least pretend they matter? Just do something to make her happy?” 

 

“I’m not going to pretend,” he said. “I’m not going to turn my life into a lie to make my parents happy.” 

 

“Oh, really?” She met his gaze easily. “And you think that’s what I do?” 

 

“You’ve lived with your boyfriend for three years, and they still don’t know.” He took a sip. “So yeah, I do.” 

 

“Because you’re so honest and straightforward about who _you_ date.” 

 

He could see that she knew, and he had known that she had known for a very long time, but neither of them ever acknowledged it. It was like a disgraced family member they never mentioned, just something they liked to sweep to the side so that it didn’t cause trouble for anyone. He kept her secret, and she had kept his, and they didn’t speak about either because they wanted to avoid unnecessary pain. 

 

“Don’t,” he told her softly. 

 

She nodded, lips pressed firmly together. Her hair was long, straightened, darker than it had been over winter break, and it made her cheekbones stand out like blades. It occurred to him that she was very beautiful and very strong and very kind, and he wanted to reach forward and tell her this, but he just sat there and drank his coffee and watched the plants die in the corner of the room. 

 

“Should I go back to pretending I don’t know anything?” 

 

He nodded. 

 

She took out her keys. “So you can lie about important things, but you can’t manage an insignificant lie to make Mom happy?” 

 

“Jesus fucking Christ,” he said. “I’ll go to church if that will shut everyone up.” 

 

“Don’t be like that. Mom’s worried about--” She broke off, rolled her eyes, and it was a gesture for Isco more than for herself. It was to say _here, look, I’m still on your side. I haven’t grown up so much that I’ve left you behind_. “She’s worried about your soul.” 

 

“Fuck my soul,” he told her. “I’m trying to be a decent son, a decent brother, a decent everything, but everyone here is driving me up the wall.” 

 

She laughed at his distress. “Good to be home, isn’t it?” 

 

He ignored her and walked to his room, shut the door and sat down, then got back up and washed his hands in the sink, but the cherry juice still stained his fingernails. He looked at his hands and at the sink, and he thought for a very long time about Barista Boy and how shame had gotten in the way of things. He remembered one morning when they were swimming in Brazil, how they’d thrown those plastic pool toys at each other and laughed, and he remembered the feeling of fear in the pit of his stomach when they’d accidentally kissed in public. He was so afraid the kiss had turned into something horrible and every kiss after that was a plague on his lips, a poison not peace. 

 

He returned to his bed and lay down and flipped open a book he’d been trying to finish for a year and a half. He finally accepted, as he normally did, that _War and Peace_ was just not going to happen, so he pulled out his phone and found a video where a black-haired girl was on her knees with her fuck-me eyes and pom-poms, and he wanted so badly to want her. It killed him how bad he wanted to want her. She was beautiful, and she sucked cock like a pro, and under normal circumstances, it would have been enough to turn him on, maybe, but it was like feeling around in the dark. 

 

He grew frustrated and alone, sick of himself in a way he hadn’t been since that day in the snow. He walked back to the kitchen, cheeks flushed, and his sister pointed to his keys on the counter. 

 

“Thanks.” 

 

“You got somewhere to be? Party or something?” 

 

“It’s, like, Tuesday.” 

 

“It’s Thursday. Thursday is the new Friday. Don’t you have somewhere to be?” 

 

He thought about it. “No, but thanks for making me feel like I have no fucking friends.” 

 

“Language,” she said, pointing at his mouth like that would silence him. “And why don’t you go to Bia’s’s if you’re so desperate to get out of the house?” 

 

“Can’t. Toni’s there.” 

 

“What’s wrong with Toni? I think he’s nice.” 

 

“I threw out all my pretzels,” he said sadly, with no other explanation, and then he wandered morosely back to his room, thoughts of Barista Boy mingling with thoughts of Toni and their time in the kitchen and his upsetting phone call. 

 

So for the second time that evening, he stretched out on his bed, and with a determination that would normally make his penis more upset than anything, he pulled up a porno with two men and a subplot involving the drug trade in Florida. Finally it happened, and he was pleased and miserable, satisfied and unfulfilled, and he fell asleep to the sound of his parents walking through the front door, speaking rapidly in a language he didn’t understand. 

 

+ 

 

When Isco saw Toni next, it was before their afternoon shift, and he was standing outside the ice cream shop across the street from the restaurant. It was one of those Ice Cream Palaces that had an antique sign with _Shoppe_ and french words and mosaics on the outer walls, as if those things made it anything more than an ice cream shop. 

 

Toni was standing outside with his arm around a leggy blonde girl. She had on a crop top and high-waisted denim shorts, and when her hand dangled next to her leg holding her phone, it was skin against skin. Miles and miles of skin. Skin for days. Isco’s mouth went dry because he was filled to the brim with the desire to want. He _should have_ wanted her, so he could almost fool himself into thinking he did. 

 

Toni was licking his ice cream slowly and deliberately. It was bright pink and dripping, and some of it landed on his nose as he raised it over his face to attack at a better angle. Isco realized, in that moment when he looked most beautiful, that he wasn’t particularly handsome. His face wasn’t perfectly shaped, and there was nothing remarkably interesting about any of his features. His eyes were fine, but they were boring. His lips were small, but they weren’t awful. His cheekbones were good enough. There was nothing _wrong_ with the way he looked. He wasn’t unattractive, but he wasn’t something to drool over either. He wasn’t someone Isco would want for days; he wasn’t the face to lose sleep over, but in that moment with the ice cream dripping over his face, when he was smiling and laughing with his arms around someone else, he was something north of beautiful. 

 

Then their eyes met, and the illusion was ruined. Isco’s face darkened, and he turned away angrily. He pushed open the restaurant door, and by the time Toni joined him in the kitchen, he was already halfway through making a pie to add to the cold case in the front window. 

 

“Good ice cream across the street,” Toni told him, because they were in the back, away from the mess of cooks handling the current rush. 

 

(Isco secretly liked this time better, when they were baking desserts or cooking casseroles for the richly advertised _Grab ‘n Go!_ section. It felt much more authentic than the rush. No one was yelling, no one was slipping in the milk that someone else hadn’t yet cleaned up because a customer had demanded ranch dressing three times in a row and everyone had simultaneously forgotten because how much ranch dressing does one person need? They were just mixing ingredients and spilling flour and packaging pies in neat little yellow boxes). 

 

“Oh,” Isco said, because he couldn’t think of anything better to say. Then, after a moment, “Yeah, I’ve been there, and it’s alright. The one with Oreos in it isn’t bad.” 

 

“I mean,” he said, handing Isco the bowl of pitted cherries, “If it’s got Oreos in it, it can’t really be bad, can it?” 

 

Isco agreed intensely, but he just shrugged and began dusting the pie crust. “Good place to go on a date,” he said lightly. “If you’re into that sort of thing, which it seems like you are.” 

 

“A date?” Toni repeated, surprised. “With-- oh, with the girl from today?” He shook his head. “A friend.” 

 

“Right. A friend.” 

 

He went on with the pie, and Toni mimicked his motions, starting an entirely new one. This time he prepared peaches for the inside. The worked in silence for a very long time until Isco found himself smiling at their rhythm. He didn’t even have to ask. Toni already knew what he was reaching for, and it was in his hand, waving delicately beneath Isco’s nose like it was balancing on a silver platter. 

 

“It would be a good place,” Toni said, after a long time. His voice was as balanced and calm as it ever was, but there was something tense in his jaw, something hurried about the way he moved his hands. 

 

“What are you talking about?” 

 

“The ice cream shop. It would be a good place for a date.” He looked up at Isco. “You know, if you were into that sort of thing.” 

 

He stood there for a moment. His limbs turned to jelly, and his tongue had forgotten how to move, and he shook his head without knowing why. “Yeah,” he said, but his head was saying no. “I’m-- yeah.” 

 

“And are you?” Toni prompted. He had set the peaches aside. 

 

Isco kept working. He put the pie in the oven and wiped the sweat from his forehead. “Am I what?” 

 

“Are you into that sort of thing?” 

 

He cracked an egg against the side of a bowl and then three more, stirring it vigorously. After he was positive the mixture had absolutely no shells and no lumps and was as soup and mixed as possible, he looked up and asked pleasantly, “What sort of thing?” 

 

“Dates,” Toni replied, still infuriatingly calm. 

 

“I guess they’re fine,” he said. “Though it depends on the person.” 

 

He made a thoughtful sound and returned to his peaches, and Isco felt like smashing the bowl of eggs to the floor and yelling “What the fuck do you think you’re doing? This is it. This is exactly what I’m trying to avoid. Boys and their animalistic tendencies. Me, and my shame. Tell me what you mean. Better yet, show me. Say it straightforwardly, so I can tell you straightforwardly that I hate what you mean.” 

 

But he did nothing but return to his work, and when his aunt stopped waitressing and came to the bakery portion of the kitchen to visit her boys, he forced his blood to boil and shot Toni at least fifteen awful glares. It was immature, but it was self-preservation. 

 

It was their turn to close, and neither of them had gotten a chance to eat, so Isco reluctantly sat down at a table with Toni and they shared a plate of fries, a quarter of cherry pie that hadn’t sold, and grilled cheese. They ate in silence at first, and Isco was beginning to have those creeping feelings of guilt. There were times when he looked up at Toni and Toni was looking back at him, and he had such a genuine expression on his face, not _kind_ , not _nice_ , just genuine and full of meaning. 

 

“I like your family,” Toni said finally. His fork scraped against the plate, and Isco moved some of his half of the pie over. He nodded for the other boy to take it, and he did. “They’re nice. Your aunt especially. Your mom, your dad. Your sister. They take me to Mass sometimes, like I’m part of the family.” 

 

“You’re _not_ ,” Isco said harshly, but he didn’t mean it in an awful way. It was just disturbing, to think of Toni as part of the family. Firstly because it interrupted Isco’s role. Secondly, and perhaps more importantly, because there was a part of Isco that was still thinking about that question concerning dates. 

 

But Toni didn’t-- and couldn’t-- know that, so he looked taken aback and hurt, surprised that Isco would stoop to that level. 

 

“That’s not what I meant,” he said roughly. His voice sounded strained. “I know they’re yours. I didn’t mean to-- I’m not trying to intrude. If that’s what you think. If that’s why you don’t like me.” 

 

“That’s not what I meant,” Isco said, in a softer voice this time, spilling Toni’s words back to him. “That’s really not what I meant at all.” He was quiet and hopeful and then: “And for the record, they like you too.” 

 

Toni smiled gently, and it seemed that Isco’s comment was forgotten because he launched into a calm summary of something he’d learned in class the semester before, about the food served in restaurants and how dirty kitchens were and how the animals were treated before slaughter. Then, inexplicably, the conversation turned into something else, and they were talking about books they had read, and they were laughing because neither of them could finish _War and Peace_. 

 

“Has anyone finished it? I mean, honestly, has anyone in the world ever read that goddamn book? I used to sit in my grandma’s house and look at the spine of that book, and I told myself that someday I was going to read it, but-- jesus, I think I’m going to die without reading that thing.” 

 

Toni was laughing, and his eyes crinkled at the edges when he did that, and Isco found his own smile fading because he was too busy staring, and then they were both stuck in the aftermath of a smile. It was fading, dripping off their lips, and the emotion had slithered into their eyes instead. 

 

Toni’s gaze dropped to the table. “Are we going to be awful to each other in the morning?” 

 

“Yes,” Isco answered honestly. 

 

“I don’t want the morning to come.” 

 

“Why not?” 

 

“Because I like this. Because I like you.” 

 

Isco kept eating his fries, and then he stood up to put his plates away, and when he returned to the table, Toni was finished too. He washed the plates and put them away and wiped down the counters in the kitchen and the bakery. He came back, and Toni was looking out the window, visibly confused and upset. 

 

“I’m sorry if I--” 

 

“Do you need a ride?” 

 

“What?” 

 

Isco sighed impatiently. “Do you need a ride? My car is the only one in the lot.” 

 

“I walked today. I can walk back.” 

 

“It’s dark. I’ll drive. I’m pulling the car around. You lock up.” 

 

He threw Toni the keys and hurried out the door and, while Toni closed all the blinds and prepared to close the door for the final time that evening, Isco walked quickly to his car, sweating and dying in the heat. He blinked quickly, trying to wake himself up to what was happening. He was hurting so bad everything seemed numb. 

 

He got in the car and pulled it around to the front of the restaurant, and Toni was standing out there with his bag in one hand. His house keys dangled from a lanyard around his neck, and Isco sighed again, but this time it wasn’t impatient. It was wistful and sad, and there was a longing in him for something, for someone, that he had never laid his hands on, that he had never truly known-- but it was a wistful, sad sound because he knew now that he would never have that opportunity. Not because of anything he had said, not because of any mistake he had made, but because he was too ashamed, too afraid at his very core to be anything other than the sum of those awful feelings. 

 

“You don’t have to do this,” Toni mumbled, but he got in anyway, and they drove in the dark until they reached Beatriz’s house. 

 

The ride was silent and uncomfortable, and they rolled the windows down so the summer heat would touch the stagnant sorrow in the car. It did nothing but make the sorrow sweat and multiply, and the leather seats in the car were sweating and dying too. 

 

“I don’t understand,” Toni said, as they sat in the driveway. “I don’t understand why you hate me so much. I don’t know what I ever did to you.” 

 

“You didn’t do anything,” Isco said softly. “You didn’t do a thing.” 

 

“If I didn’t do anything wrong, that really doesn’t explain why you don’t like me.” 

 

He wanted to open his mouth and explain, but how was he supposed to say _I don’t like you because I like you and liking you is painful_? There was no easy or logical way to say that, and so he didn’t. Instead he gestured to the door. 

 

“Try not to be late tomorrow.” 

 

Later, around midnight, Isco was sitting on his bed trying to work everything out in his bed like it was a math problem, like he could add up all his mistakes and subtract the things he’d done right and multiply by the intensity with which he was ignoring his true feelings. Somehow, it would show him an image of what he had done. 

 

But all he saw was this: a spoiled boy, a rotten boy sitting in the kitchen when a light walks in. The light is beautiful and smug and consumes sugar by the pound.The light moves toward the boy, and the boy moves away because, attracted to the light, he fears it, as he fears everything he loves. In an instant, everything is ruined before it even begins. 

 

+ 

 

In the morning, he was standing against the wall eating cereal in boxers and a flannel shirt when his phone buzzed on the counter. It was Barista Boy, and the text wasn’t anything special, just _Can we talk? I’m not interested in starting anything up again. I just want to understand what happened_. 

 

Isco felt like picking up his phone and saying Nope Bye. But he just ignored the message and got dressed for work and ignored Toni until Beatriz walked in to check on them, and then they started their daily squabble. This time it was because they were pitting cherries again and Isco put his hand right on Toni’s white shirt. 

 

“What the hell was that for?” 

 

“I tripped,” he lied, “And your shoulder was right there.” 

 

His mouth was a straight line. “You just happened to trip, and you just happened to put your red, wet hand on my white shirt? All of this was a coincidence, yes?” 

 

He shrugged. “Shit happens?” 

 

“Yeah, shit happens,” he muttered. “But there’s a difference between shit happening and _you_ happening.” 

 

Very quietly, he said, “And which of those happened last night? Shit or me?” 

 

Toni’s expression darkened. Instead of stumbling away embarrassed, he narrowed his eyes and said, “I’m beginning to think they’re the same thing after all.” 

 

He slung a towel over his shoulder and went back to pitting cherries, and when Bea asked what happened to his shirt, he looked up at Isco briefly before saying, “I forgot my hands were stained.” 

 

+

 

As time passed, the heat intensified. Beatriz’s plants died in her kitchen, and she replaced them with fresh green ones, fated to die because she never grasped the concept of watering them. When Isco was younger, he used to water the corner-of-the-room plants with chlorinated water from the pool, thinking that because it was brighter and smelled better than normal water, it must also have life-giving properties that normal water did not. After awhile, he realized he was killing the plants faster and he abandoned them to their shared fate. 

 

With Toni in the house, Isco thought maybe the plants would survive a summer, but they kept on dying, same as always. Little did Isco know, Toni _had_ made a pitiful attempt to save the dying plants at the beginning of summer. He’d grown accustomed to waking up early, helping Beatriz with breakfast until she escaped the house to tend to the plants in her backyard--those she remembered to water; she had developed the alien belief that, if plants were indoors, they were already spoiled enough, and they should figure out how to survive on their own. And as she saved the plants in her backyard, he tiptoed to the sink, filled a glass of water, and circled the kitchen to fill the tall, thickly-painted vases that hadn’t been filled by anything but death for years. 

 

For a brief period of time, the plants in the kitchen bloomed like the plants outdoors, and it made Toni happy to see Beatriz happy, and things were simply, as things always are at the beginning of something fresh and beautiful. The summer heat was enjoyable back then, not yet exhausting. And then he heard that the prodigal son was returning, and he thought _a friend, maybe_ , and then he met Isco, and he stopped thinking entirely. 

 

So technically, when Isco walked into Beatriz’s kitchen that first day wit the pre-conceived notion that the plants _must_ be dying because the plants were _always_ dying, he was wrong. He had unknowingly found the plants in the best condition they had ever been, but his arrival meant the end of their good health. Because as soon as Isco walked through that door and sat himself down, sweating and panting because of the heat he had grown unaccustomed to, Toni completely forgot about the plants. 

 

What had once been his secret mission, the culmination of an insatiable desire to prove himself useful, was now forgotten like Isco’s attempts to water with chlorine. So the abandoned plants lived and died in the corners of that kitchen for another summer because of wandering minds and boys who couldn’t make up their mind. 

 

One hot Sunday in the middle of June, when new plants were growing their way to death in the corners, the whole family was over at Beatriz’s after Mass. Isco had been forced to go, so he was in a terrible, grumbling mood, and the persistent presence of Toni only made things worse. 

 

The kitchen was hot and stuffy and smelled like fresh bread, olive oil, and vinegar. It was so hot he could feel his brain melting against the insides of his skull, but no one else seemed to notice. His sister was sitting there across the table with her boyfriend, who adoringly followed her around to Mass, to family gatherings, to death probably. She was wearing an orange sundress, and he was in Sunday best, patting his forehead occasionally to rid himself of the sweat developing on his brow. 

 

Isco’s father was pacing the kitchen floor. Fully recovered from his cold, he was more anxious and excited than ever, and as he helped Beatriz prepare brunch, he called out to his daughter’s boyfriend, asking him questions about work, about taxes, about real life shit that made Isco queasy. The knowledge that he would one day have to deal with taxes and work and _real life shit_ made the heat all the more unbearable and made his family all the more unknowable. 

 

Toni was leaning against the counter, pointedly not looking at Isco. He was untouched by the heat. Sweating, but there was something less defeated, less exhausted about his eyes. Over the past two weeks, they had grown less distant, fighting over everything, arguing like siblings and taking turns driving each other home on days they closed the restaurant together. During those rides and those rides alone, they were able to call a truce. They talked about school, about the town, about the dust that was taking over Beatriz’s backyard and about the plants that died in the corners. They addressed the pointlessness of their fighting and, during one memorable and painful conversation, they acknowledged that they would have, could have, should have been friends in an alternate universe, in a different reality, in a place where realities did not exist. 

 

In the cars at night, after the doors of the restaurant were firmly closed and the last of the teenagers making midnight ice cream runs were kicked out, they had those startling conversations that suspended reality and the impossibility of their connection, if only for the short ride from work to home. Because in that car, under those streetlights and between those speedbumps, they were neither work colleagues nor pseudo cousins. They were just people who found it very difficult to say goodbye at the end of the night. 

 

Just the previous night, they had gone over to a couple teenagers-- around fourteen or fifteen, one of the more frightening ages-- and told them they had to leave because the restaurant had been closed for fifteen minutes. The kids apologized, finished their shakes for another ten minutes, and finally disappeared, two by two like they were splotches of ink being blotted out. 

 

Then it was just Toni and Isco, and it was Isco’s turn to drive them home, so he pulled the car around to the front while Toni locked the door, and they sat there in the car for a moment while Toni searched the dark corners of his mind for something he had stored there earlier. Most days he set something aside, thinking, _we’ll talk about this_ , and then the conversation exploded in every odd direction, and the original point was lost in the chaos and the clutter of Isco’s overwhelming mind. 

 

He said, “Your family is very religious, aren’t they.” 

 

It wasn’t a question, and normally Isco would have found something to pick apart, but he was in the car, so his eyes were soft, and his voice was relaxed when he replied, “Yes.” 

 

“But you don’t seem to be.” 

 

“No. I used to be. It just doesn’t feel the same anymore, you know? It’s not the same when you think about things in terms of reality. Like, Noah was pretty cool when he was just part of a fairytale. Moses was great when he was in a movie. God was powerful enough when he was just granting wishes.” 

 

Toni made a noise like Isco had a point, and he looked out the window, wishing they could say things in the light. “Does your family know that you don’t buy into it anymore?” 

 

“No, of course not. I mean, I think they know, but we haven’t formally acknowledged it. There’s a difference between knowing and acknowledging. If my mother ever accepted the fact that I don’t go to Church, that I don’t pray, that I haven’t been to confession in ages, that I use the Lord’s name in vain-- I think it would kill her.” 

 

“And you don’t to kill your mother,” Toni said, nodding in agreement. He had a funny way of accepting certain statements. Where most people would just nod briefly, Toni got this intense look of concentration. 

 

“When she lectures me about dropping _crumbs_ I do,” he muttered. 

 

Toni laughed, and that was where Isco found himself on the hot Sunday morning in the middle of June, somewhere dying in that laugh from the previous night. The heat was so intense and the kitchen was so unpleasant and stuffy that it seemed to have the power to alter time, to bend it backwards, to twist it around sideways, to make it a circle, to make it undying and possible. Because of the heat and because all time existed at all moments, he was able to return to that time in the car, to sit in the dark once more and hear Toni’s genuine, beautiful laugh, like he was hearing it for the first time, like he was living and dying in that car, beneath those streetlights and between those speedbumps. 

 

“Isco,” his mother was saying, “Are you hearing anything I’m saying?” 

 

“No,” he answered honestly. “I was just thinking, sorry.” 

 

“Well at least you’re using that brain for something these days.” She threw her hands in the air and muttered something in Spanish that he couldn’t understand and probably didn’t want to understand. “I was just telling your aunt about that theology course you took this year.” 

 

Beatriz nodded, prompting him to speak. 

 

“Yeah,” he said. “Yeah, I took it because it was the requirement, so.” 

 

Toni looked over at him. “Your school has a theology requirement?” 

 

“It’s a Jesuit school,” he mumbled, unable to meet his eyes, because of the laugh and because he was still lost in it. 

 

“It’s a _what_?” 

 

“A _Jesuit_ school. They’re an order of--” 

 

“I know what the Jesuits are. I just couldn’t hear--” 

 

“Well maybe it would help if you listened a little better.” 

 

“Francisco,” his mother said warningly. He shut his mouth, and she waved her hand again, “Now tell your aunt about the class.” 

 

“It was Introduction to the Comparative Study of Religion.” He bit his knuckle. They were all staring at him, and he was sweating and hating the heat and hating Toni. “It was pretty boring, to be honest.” 

 

“That’s alright,” his sister’s boyfriend said agreeably. Daniel was always infuriatingly polite, always trying to calm everyone down at family gatherings. “I’m sure you learned plenty anyway. You know, sometimes the most rewarding classes are the most boring. Sometimes you get so much out of them, even if they’re dull and dry.” 

 

“I hope my sister can say the same about you,” he muttered, not thinking before it fell out of his mouth, and then once he said it, he couldn’t take it back because his mother was ranting in Spanish and Beatriz was trying to calm her down, and then the two of them were yelling at each other about Isco’s discipline and his father was standing at the counter continuing to cook, pressing a finger to the center of his forehead to relieve the tension there. 

 

He nodded to the door, and Isco slipped out quietly, ignoring his sister’s shouting and Daniel’s quiet, almost apologetic presence. Isco had a habit of creating chaos in his family that way. He would say something inflammatory, and the shouting would begin because of him, and then it would turn into something else entirely. He was the only one who could create a drama so magnetic that it could draw everyone in, distracting them until he could slip away unnoticed. 

 

He was out near the peach trees that lined the tennis court when he saw Toni approaching, and he briefly considered the fact that they were alone, that they were not psuedo cousins and they were not co-workers, not in the orchard, not beyond the tennis court, not beyond the pool. Not here, two wild things among other wild things being scorched by the sun. 

 

Toni stood beside him, and they looked at nothing together. “So,” he said, squinting underneath the light, “That seemed like a good idea.” 

 

“Shut up,” he said. 

 

He reached up to pull a peach from the tree, taking a second to spit on his sleeve and wash the dirt from its skin. He bit into it and, juice dripping down his chin, said, “You know, you act like a child. I mean, really, you act like you’re a teenager still stuck in that angsty phase.” 

 

“There are some very dark and troubling emotional issues that I have to take care of,” he said sarcastically. 

 

Toni nearly smiled. “If you stopped being an asshole for, like, one minute of your life, you might realize that people are actually trying to help you.” 

 

But he couldn’t give up his anger because they had grown fond of one another. He liked the way his anger felt against his shoulders, the way gave him wings and a razor sharp tongue, the way it gave him the power to hurt someone before they hurt him. He liked that his anger kept him apart from boys, beautiful boys with beautiful lips and tormented eyes. He liked that his anger kept him away from being in love and the terror that it inspired. 

 

And his anger loved him too. His anger loved that it could shelter him in solitude, that it could take his quiet weeping of childhood and harden it, strengthen it, turn it into vile rage. It liked that he was not a child anymore. It liked that Isco could not connect to his family, could not bear being drained by the heat. It loved him when he was frustrated and loved him when he was afraid. 

 

Some days he felt like his pride and his anger were the only things keeping him from splitting apart and becoming a half-person, so when the opportunity arose -- when Toni arrived and asked him to be vulnerable and asked him to be afraid but act anyway -- he found it most difficult to separate from those parts of himself. 

 

“I don’t need any help,” he said. His palms were sweaty. It was the kind of heat that made every inch of his body alive and frustrated. Every limb could feel itself. “Honestly. I don’t.” 

 

“Do you realize what we do almost every night?” He was asking like maybe Isco really didn’t know. “Do you realize that we’re almost friends? That if you didn’t put this horrible mask on, we would actually be friends?” 

 

“I know,” he said, in the voice he only used when they were not co-workers or cousins. “If we didn’t hate each other so much, we would be friends.” 

 

“But that’s the problem,” Toni said sadly. “We don’t hate each other at all.” 

 

The peach was forgotten in his hand, warm and sticky and abandoned. He threw it to the worms. 

 

+ 

 

After the blow-up at Beatriz’s, two major things happened: First, Isco’s sister announced that she had been living with her boyfriend for three years; Second, she decided that if Isco couldn’t keep his mouth shut, she wouldn’t keep hers shut either, and she promptly told their parents that he hadn’t been to Mass or confession for a full year and, worse, that he had been hiding his sexual conduct from them. 

 

They reacted poorly to the first bit of news. Their father was more accepting, and he briefly stepped forward to ask her about practical things like pregnancy and what they would do if something like that happened and what would happen if such-and-such came up, and were they going to get married? Yes, she said. Yes, but they didn’t know when. Yes, maybe when school was over. Yes, maybe. Maybe. 

 

Their mother blew up, but her explosion was halted when Anastasia dropped the bomb about Isco. They already knew that he was having doubts, lost in the anxiety and confusion of being young, but they didn’t realized that it had reached the point of absolute and utter conviction. 

 

So they agreed that Anastasia could do what she wanted because she had kept it a secret for three years and nothing horrible had happened, and she was still in trouble, but she was an adult, but Isco-- 

 

They were furious and certain, and they decided the only way they could save his soul was to send him to Sunday School, and Isco was fine with that when they told him. Fine, he thought. Fine, he would go to Bible School on Sundays after Mass with all the other adolescents whose parents hated them, and he would play on his phone or think or sleep while it went on. If anything, it made him more certain about his doubts, and he was not an inch closer to believing in any divine master. 

 

They were driving home two nights after he was hit with the sentence, and Isco was in the driver’s seat complaining. They didn’t speak about their conversation beneath the peach tree because that conversation had not occurred. Or maybe it had occurred but was forgotten. Or maybe it had not yet occurred. Maybe it was never to occur. Maybe it had always happened and was continuing to happen. Whatever the truth was, it was clear that time did not exist in the car between places, and when they were stuck in the in-between, they could be the people they longed to be. 

 

“The name is misleading,” Isco told him, as they took the long way back to Beatriz’s. “Sunday School is not just on Sundays. It’s three times a week, and it’s actually called _Bible School_ , but my _mother_ said Sunday School, and all her church friends say Sunday School like they’re not sending their children to prison three times a week.” 

 

Toni unwrapped a chocolate bar. Biting into it, he said, “What do you need it three times a week for?” 

 

“Oh, to keep the devil out of my soul.” 

 

“Isn’t he already in there?” 

 

“That’s what I keep telling them,” he said loudly. “But no one will listen.” 

 

“Just, like, kill a cow in the center of the room or something. Bathe in its blood, I don’t know.” 

 

Isco snorted. “Did you just tell me to kill a cow?” 

 

“You’re right, that’s horrible. I love cows.” 

 

Isco pretended to think about it. “Do you think it’d work though? Do you think they’d be convinced that even three times a week can’t save me?” 

 

“Only if you dripped blood all over yourself.” He bit into the candy bar again and then almost immediately put it back in his pocket. “Okay, I lost my appetite.” 

 

Isco laughed again, and he didn’t realize it, but it was the sort of laugh Toni would lose himself in, would think about for hours later, would fall asleep with the laughter ringing in his ears-- maybe the laughter was still going on, maybe it had never stopped, maybe time was a circle, unbroken and unending, in which all things were possible. 

 

“You’re over here talking about ritual sacrifices, and I’m the one being forced into Sunday School?” 

 

“ _Bible_ School.” 

 

Isco smiled again and, for a moment, he gave in to his private fantasy. The sky was hot, and they weren’t co-workers or cousins, and that time in the car wasn’t only time in the car. It extended beyond the time it took to get from work to home. In this unreality, they could walk through the house without fighting. They didn’t have to walk to the edge of the pool and beyond to make some sort of connection. The connection was already there and made and could not be unmade. 

 

But unrealities don’t last, so when they pulled up to Beatriz’s house, it was with a heavy heart that Isco pulled his mind out of his ass and set it on the right path again. He arranged his features into something far less gentle and much more unkind and said goodbye in his normal, stiff way. 

 

“See you tomorrow?” 

 

“I’m working the late shift again. Bible Study goes until two.” 

 

“Shit.” Toni swatted at a mosquito on his leg. “Alright, then. Tell me how it goes.” 

 

“Yeah,” he said. Then, without thinking, “I’ll call you.” 

 

That’s how it began, with a hot June evening, with the mosquitoes and the oppressive air, with an accident of the best kind. Their time in the car was extended to their time on the phone, and so a different portal through time and reality was opened. In their voices, there was longing and want, but there was also restraint. What they wanted to say, what they needed to say, what they were living and dying to say -- all that and more would remain unsaid. But despite not accomplishing everything, despite leaving so much left to say, the phone calls made the time in the car seem less like a dream. 

 

That very first night, after Bible Study and after a very long shift at the restaurant, Isco had driven home and crawled into bed and thought long and hard about not calling Toni, and he told himself that he was not going to call him. He decided not to call him. But in the end, there was nothing to do but to call him. 

 

They had each other’s cell numbers to contact each other for hours, so there was no rifling around for a number written on a napkin, no having to call his aunt’s home phone number and pretending to need to speak to Toni for a work-related matter. It was surprisingly simple, like it was just another Should Have in a long line of Should Haves that became Regrets. 

 

“Hey,” he said softly, sounding like he had just woken up or he was trying very hard to stay awake. 

 

“Hey,” Isco said back. He put his head back on the pillow and shut his eyes. He needed to concentrate for this. “Tell me about your shift.” 

 

“Tell me about Bible School. I want to hear this.” 

 

“We studied the Story of Creation. Nothing very interesting there except we learned that Eve should serve her husband, and then this one guy in the front tried to pass it off as _not_ awful, and I was, like, what the hell, you know? Like there’s a way to do this whole religion thing in a way that isn’t fucked up, but this town is just--” 

 

“Doing it the fucked up way?” 

 

“Yeah,” he said, after a second. He opened his eyes and stared at the medals on his desk, and suddenly he was getting that feeling that he had once gotten when he was drunk in the snow, like he desperately wanted to speak to someone and he desperately wanted to be open and honest about things. 

 

“Are you okay though?” 

 

Isco squirmed. He hated that question. Hated it for the way it implied an inherent weakness, like some part of him must not be okay. Something must have prompted the question. It made him nervous, foolish, agitated. 

 

“Yeah, I’m good. It sucked though. And now I’ve got to do it three times a week for the whole summer thanks to my fucking sister.” 

 

Toni made an agreeable sound at the back of his throat. “Your Bible thing does suck. Like, that’s awful and all, but do you realize that _you’re_ also a problem?” 

 

“I am not,” he said immediately. Then, “How?”

 

He bunched the covers up under his chin and shut his eyes and pretended that he wasn’t hearing the voice through the phone. It was so much nicer to pretend that someone was beside him, so much nicer to pretend the phone meant the car meant freedom. 

 

“Why can’t you just be nice to me? It’s so stupid. We get along. We’re friends. But you have to hide it for-- god. Why? I don’t understand. I don’t understand why you can’t just be --” 

 

“A normal person?” 

 

“No, that’s not--” 

 

“A normal person,” he repeated. 

 

“Well, yeah.” 

 

So he took a deep breath and, without feeling a thing-- no pain, no remorse, no surge of emotion. nothing.-- said plainly into the phone the very thing he had thought impossible to voice a few weeks earlier: “I don’t like you because I like you and liking you is painful.” 

 

Toni was quiet for a second and then, a little smugly, “I know. I just wanted to hear you say it.” 

 

“This is stupid,” he said. He swore under his breath. “This is why I hate you, by the way, and I really, really do. You’re listening to me make a fool of myself, sitting there so fucking smug and horrible and-- you, with your... face and--” He was quickly losing steam, but the fire was still burning. 

 

“Me with my face,” Toni repeated mildly. “Wow. It’s truly incredible the amount of thought you put into the things you say.” 

 

“I put in thought,” he said defensively, immediately flashing back to what he had said to Anastasia’s boyfriend. 

 

“Alright,” Toni said to placate him. 

 

They dipped steadily into another comfortable silence, and Isco was staring up at the ceiling trying to force himself to not only know but to also acknowledge what he had just done. A weight should have dropped on his shoulders. He should have felt more than a restless anxiety in his fingertips. He should have _needed_ Toni to say it back, to repeat what he had said back in the diner except more and with a different, deeper emotion attached. But he didn’t need it. Or if he did, he didn’t yet feel that it was a necessity. There was just that restless anxiety in his fingertips. He could feel his own pulse throbbing heavily. 

 

“I’ve already said it to you a million times,” Toni said finally. “So, just this once, you get to sit there in silence and suffer.” 

 

“You what?” 

 

“I’ve told you how I feel, and you’re--” 

 

“ _Excuse me_. You have _not_. You absolutely have not--” 

 

“I told you in the diner that I liked you, and you got up and left. I asked you about dates in the bakery.” 

 

He was about to keep going, but Isco struggled to win the argument from there. “You...could just as easily have been talking about the dried fruit.” 

 

“I clearly was not talking about the dried fruit.” 

 

Then they went on to talk about other things, as if they had not just spoken about something too intimate to be spoken aloud. Toni broke down as many different kinds of dried fruit as he could remember, and he spoke about the sugar content and which kinds of hummus went well with dates, and Isco turned his nose up at that, and then they got into an argument about different kinds of food. Isco liked sushi and hamburgers, and none of the dishes his mother made. Toni liked all of the dishes Isco’s mother made a wide variety of food. He didn’t like sushi at all, but they could agree that hamburgers were proof that the world was not all bad after all. 

 

After the activity of the conversation had died down and they were very close to falling asleep, Toni said, “We’re going to be awful to each other tomorrow.” 

 

And Isco replied, “Yes.” 

 

They hung up before they fell asleep, both very sorry to leave, half-wishing they were strangers with different regrets and different desires. 

 

+ 

 

The next morning was hot and uncomfortable. Isco ate breakfast on the way to Bible Study, swore and lied his way through a confession, and sat down later to deal with the guilt. He wished he could make peace with his religion and the god of his youth, but the god of his youth had moved on to different children who still believed in movies and the make-believe. He felt like believing in the all-powerful would be the ultimate game of hide-and-seek. Faith was a game for children; it was a lie lucid people told themselves in order to make peace with the hell around them. 

 

So he lied to the priest, and he ate his meal alone at the sandwich shop around the corner from the restaurant, and before it was his shift with Toni, he texted Barista Boy back. _It’s not a good time right now. I’m really sorry. Maybe later._ His reply lacked substance. It was weeks late. Sending it did about as much good as watering with chlorinated water had done the plants when he was much younger. 

 

But still feeling like he had taken care of something, he confronted Toni with a confidence he hadn’t thought possible. He nodded to him, threw him an apron, said, “We’re making coconut cakes today. Try and keep up.” 

 

“I’ll see if I can manage.” 

 

They sorted the ingredients into little piles, and Isco wiped the sweat off his forehead and washed his hands again carefully. He moaned about the heat while he watched Toni’s delicate hands shake out the shredded coconut into measuring cups. 

 

“Did you ever think about going to culinary school?” Toni asked him very quietly, adorable without meaning to be as he looked around, checked their surroundings in an attempt to keep their cover. He wouldn’t have spoken if someone had been hovering over his shoulder. 

 

“No,” Isco said quietly back. “Why would I do that.” 

 

“Because you’re amazing,” Toni said, like it was already an established fact and it was not up for discussion. 

 

“Yes,” Isco agreed, because maybe he was a tiny bit of an asshole after all. “But why would I do that when my mother and my aunt own this place. I don’t have to go to culinary school to become the master chef here someday. I’ll just take over for mom and Bea, if they ever want me to.” 

 

“And do they want you to?” 

 

He shrugged, dusting his hands with flour. “Maybe. They think I’ll fuck it up. But I think they just fear what they love.” 

 

Toni smiled. “A hereditary trait.” 

 

There were footsteps, and Isco’s features hardened into what they became when they were not in-between. They were co-workers and cousins, so he was harsh. It was awful, but it was self-preservation. 

 

The days continued like that. They yelled when they were in the presence of other people, argued until they were blue in the face. They apologized at night, in the car and on the phone. They didn’t whisper sweet-nothings and they didn’t kiss. They didn’t get all lovey-dovey. They barely acknowledged their feelings after they made everything known. 

 

It didn’t change all that much because, even if feelings were felt, they were still impossible. 

 

Some time later, when the city was covered with red and blue and silver stars for the Fourth, they were sitting in the back behind a stack of flour and chocolate powder. Toni was wiping his hands off with a towel, and Isco was fanning himself with a Fourth of July Parade pamphlet. He was thinking about the heat, Toni’s hands, the way summer was slowly eating itself. 

 

“You guys go all out for this holiday?” 

 

“Yeah, everyone gets drunk. They blow shit up.” 

 

Toni sighed, and Isco switched to fanning him instead. “That sounds interesting.” 

 

“You got anything planned?” 

 

“Your mother invited me to the parade. And I agreed to get ice cream with a friend while I’m there.” 

 

Isco shut his eyes and rested his head against the wall of flour behind him. “What, at the Ice Cream Palace across the street? Their ice cream isn’t half as good as ours. Swear to God they get it from the grocery store and just put it in their blender or something.” 

 

“Why would they buy ice cream and then blend it?” 

 

“I don’t know. It just sounds like something they would do.” 

 

Toni looked at him. “Do you realize that over half of what you say makes absolutely no sense.” 

 

“Yeah, I do realize that actually.” He butted the back of his head into the flour bags a few more times. “It’s so fucking hot. Jesus. How do you survive around here? It’s hot in the summer. It’s hot in the spring. It’s only slightly hot in the fall. It’s mild in the winter. It’s all miserable.” 

 

Toni smiled. It was the sort of smile Isco could only describe as _quiet_. Quiet in the way it crept over his face. Quiet in the way that it announced itself with the curve of his lips and the peace in his eyes. It was quietest when he looked at Isco and said, “It’s not all miserable.” 

 

And it went on like _that_ too. Their conversations in private ended with a comment and a smile, something like a drug that would tide them over until the next time they could suspend reality. Their conversations in public ended with a comment they would make up for later. It was normal. Give and take. A dance. 

 

Then on the fourth, they drove away from the parade when everyone else was distracted by the fireworks and they sat on the roof of the restaurant. They watched the sky explode, and Toni’s mouth was open. The sky was ink, and the colors ran over: first red and silver, then gold and blue; then a symphony, everything altogether. People were shouting and yelling and flapping their arms along the street below. Someone was throwing a a bottle of something that broke against the sidewalk. 

 

The sky was full of white and gold, and Toni-- still overcome with something he couldn’t describe -- tore his eyes from the sky and said, “What are you so afraid of?” 

 

“When everything is like this, there’s nothing to be afraid of. But when the lights stop, everything is different.” 

 

He shut his eyes and ignored the conversation and thought back to the middle of the day with the glaring hot sun and the girls running around in their crop tops and tight jean shorts and the boys in their half-shredded workout tops, bandanas, and crew socks. Someone had been running around with a hose, others with water guns-- everything was alive with the water and the light and the sound of the flies buzzing. 

 

He opened his eyes again and it was night. Toni was looking at him. He shook his head, slow and exaggerated, and if Isco had to imagine what he was thinking, it would have been one word; slow, snarky, like a punch to the gut: _unbelievable_. 

 

“You’re one person when you’re with me, and you’re someone else entirely when you’re around everyone else. Sometimes I wonder who you are inside your own head.” Toni touched his own temple, tapping gently with his finger a few times, moving his lips soundlessly like he was struggling to come up with something else to make Isco show him the answer. 

 

“And you think I don’t wonder the same thing?” 

 

“I think you need to figure out the answer before you go dragging people around behind you.” 

 

Isco pinched the bridge of his nose. “Can we just enjoy this? No one else is around. We don’t have to fight. We have plenty of time for fighting later.” 

 

“But that’s exactly the problem, you know?” His short, sharp laugh was out of place. The whole sky was lighting up in front of them. “You want to back out of this -- what we’re talking about right now -- because it’s real. You always have to shift away from things when they get too real. We fake it in front of everyone else. Don’t you see how at a certain point I have to ask myself when you stop faking it?” 

 

The other boy watched the fireworks before he answered. Blue took a dive and Green shot up behind it. White, gold, silver, pink. Stars were exploding and fading into colored dust. 

 

He thought long and hard before he clenched his jaw and said, “I don’t fake anything when I’m with you.” 

 

Toni fiddled with the red bandana tied around his upper arm. “And that’s why it has to be like this?” 

 

Isco considered his two worlds, and he drew up a scenario in which they collided. “Yes,” he confirmed. “That’s why it has to be like this.” 

 

They watched the rest of the fireworks, and then they watched everyone walk back to their cars or walk down the darkened streets to their houses. A few people lit sparklers to find their way home. They shone and died quickly. The two boys stayed on the roof until the night was quiet, and their phones were buzzing with questions. _Where are you? When are you coming home? Are you staying with a friend? Did you enjoy the fireworks? Where are you? When are you coming home?_  

 

They stayed a little longer, not speaking, and then, as they stood, Toni said, “Guess tomorrow is going to be like it always is.” 

 

And Isco turned toward him, all rigid and determined, and said, “Yes, it will be. But before--” 

 

He cut off and lurched forward, and the movement started off jerky and spontaneous, but the moment his mouth hit Toni’s, it was how everything was supposed to be. Everything about them was the opposite of how it was supposed to be. Isco was supposed to be religious and devoted, obedient and _straight_. Toni wasn’t supposed to be interested, and his feelings weren’t supposed to be reciprocated. They were supposed to watch the fireworks from the ground, not from the roof. They were supposed to argue. To fight. They were supposed to hate each other. 

 

Things like that, kisses like that, connections like that-- people like that -- they’re not supposed to remain a secret. Nothing about them was right or even, but that kiss was. It was everything a kiss should be, and everything a kiss will ever be. It was the only kind of kiss people really deserve. 

 

There was slightly too much pressure at first, but it was only because of desire, and once that pressure lessened, it became obvious that desire didn’t have to mean force, and lust didn’t always have to mean an absence of caring. 

 

Isco wanted to every word into that kiss. He wanted to tell Toni that he wished they could live in that time, in the Before, in that moment right before everything turned sour. 

 

Instead, he stepped back and Toni’s eyes were glazed over, and his lips were pink and beautiful. Isco said, “I wish I could give you more.” 

 

And Toni looked back with a sudden clarity and replied, “This is enough.” 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> as usual, comment or tweet me (@illarramendis) your reactions, which i'm always happy to hear.  
> also i'm taking requests. i don't always do the requests because it has to be something i'm really feeling, but i will always consider it and try really hard to work something out. 
> 
> *the beginning of this is probably really really boring but i felt like it was necessary anyway to really explain what kind of upbringing he had. sometimes the more gradually someone loses their faith, the harder it is to return to it.


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